Brink
by serenedisdain
Summary: "You fixed me," she whispered. Her hand rose automatically to feel her collarbone. "Why not?" Malfoy said. Ginny immediately processed the danger in his tone and stiffened. "He always does. Doesn't he?" Ginny/Draco. Rated M for language and themes.
1. Chapter I: The Great Pretenders

After what felt like ages, it was over, and she was alone.

But when Ginny tried to shift her weight from the cold stone floor, a dozen parts of her body protested at once, screaming out in pain, as if she'd been trampled by a herd of hippogriffs. Involuntarily, she cried out. Her collarbone especially felt as if it had been sliced open and packed with hot coals. The agony thrust her mind into blackness as it overwhelmed her.

"Weasley." The voice was dimly familiar as it drew her back to awareness, but she was too disoriented to place it. As she blinked at the strange room, things in her confused mind began to fall into place. A glimmering fire. Cold stone walls. She was laying down on a leather couch; it stuck to the backs of her bare thighs. She could smell dittany, such a common smell to someone who had been raised in a house full of boys with an impressive propensity to injure both themselves and one another. Never her, though, except for the odd accident. She had always been safe.

"Weasley, wake up." And then Ginny remembered. Alarm flashed through her brain. And then full-fledged panic. She needed to leave. She couldn't be here. Not _here_. Oh Merlin, how had she let this happen? She scrambled to her feet before a combination of pain and a tall figure standing to block her way pushed her down again.

"Are you bloody mad?" the voice hissed, and this time she knew exactly who it belonged to. She glanced at Malfoy's profile but could not make herself meet his eyes.

"I'm sorry, I have to go." But she made no move to stand. Her head was still spinning after the last attempt.

Malfoy sighed. "Yeah, right. Go ahead and walk out the door, Weasley. If you can even make it to the door, that is." The redhead said nothing to this. Everything was still very hazy; only bits and pieces of her night were coming together to make any sense, and the resulting picture was not one she wanted, or was able, to face. Eventually the thought worked its way through that she didn't hurt so badly anymore. The pain was duller now, more like being sore after a hard game of Quidditch.

"You fixed me," she whispered. Her hand rose automatically to feel her collarbone. Prodding the tender skin, she was relieved to feel no pain.

"Why not?" Malfoy said. Ginny immediately processed the danger in his tone and stiffened. "_He _always does. Doesn't he?"

"Let me leave, Malfoy." And despite how terribly exhausted she felt, she managed to inflect her tone with the infamous Weasley fire, enough of it to make Malfoy blink in surprise, though not back down.

Malfoy sat beside her on the couch. His weight made her slide a little towards him, but she scooted away to the opposite end of the couch immediately. The movement caused a stabbing pain in her ankle; she hadn't noticed it hurting before, but now it was on fire. It must have shown in her expression, because in a moment Malfoy had drawn his wand and asked simply, "Where?" She indicated her ankle. The tip of his wand was cool against her hot skin.

"_Episkey!"_ There was a loud pop and a moment of pain and then the bones had righted themselves.

"Thanks," she said shortly. He ignored it.

"Look at me, Weasley." She did. The sharp, angular planes of his pale face. His skin wasn't pale in the same way hers was – showing red every time she blushed or was angry and splotched with freckles. His was truly white, almost silvery in the fire's cast. She doubted it even burned in the sun the way hers did. It was too perfect; annoyingly perfect. But his eyes were what made her unable to turn away. Steel gray, hard, and oddly world-weary.

"Two of your bones were broken, Weasley. Your lip was split open. You had more bruises than I could count, and probably more that I missed in places I didn't feel at liberty to check. It doesn't take much to fix all that. A spell and some dittany. But chances are you have a concussion. You need to stay awake and you need to be watched. Do you understand me?"

Ginny nodded mutely. The repercussions of the situation were beginning to dawn on her, so much that she couldn't even argue. Malfoy knew. He had to know – he'd be top of his year if it weren't for Hermione and some Ravenclaw bloke, and the signs were all there. There was no way he could mistake it. She'd been humiliated before, sometimes publicly, but this kind of humiliation, with Malfoy as its only witness, felt a thousand times worse. A million times worse. The blood rushed to her face and spread across her cheeks like wildfire. But then an even worse notion struck her. What if he told somebody? What if he told everybody? The Slytherin Prince, laughing it up with his Slytherin mates in their Slytherin dungeon. All of Hogwarts would find out. Harry, Hermione, her brothers, Dumbledore, her family. Just as quickly as the blood had rushed to her face, it drained again, leaving her white as a sheet.

Malfoy knew.

She was too horrified by the thought to notice the pity in his eyes.

The mirror over the washbasin was not doing much to help Draco's mood. The face it revealed was drawn; he had never seen his cheeks so hollowed, or such deep circles pressed like bruises beneath his eyes. He didn't even have the energy to don his customary sneer. Water dripped from his skin to land noiselessly on the marble counter-top. As he stood there, glaring at himself, it took quite some time to notice that a fist was hammering obnoxiously on the door to the dormitory bathroom.

"Oi! You want to hurry up, Malfoy, I've got to take a leak!"

"Piss off," Draco muttered, but not loud enough for the ignorant git on the other side to hear.

The doorknob began to shake violently and Draco's annoyance increased. They were going to snap the bloody thing. Almost lazily, he grabbed his wand from the shelf and pointed it at the handle. A loud shriek followed by a stream of curses on the other side of the door told him that the heating spell had been effective. The doorknob remained still and there was no more knocking. Whoever it was had probably already pissed himself, adding insult to the injury of the fool's already-burned hand. It occurred to him that a situation like this would have once struck him as extremely humorous; but then again, once upon a time his dorm mates would not have even dared to rush him like that. As much as he didn't care to admit it, the Slytherin Prince no longer had much standing, even in his own house and with his own "friends." Things had changed. Everything had changed, but he couldn't quite make himself care.

Draco finished buttoning up his shirt and glanced in the mirror one last time. Pristine except for the unmistakable signs of sleep deprivation and severe anxiety, he thought, and seriously considered smashing the mirror that reminded him of everything he had not yet accomplished and still had yet to do. With his fists, not magic, just for the satisfaction of feeling something shatter, feeling it deep in his flesh. So long as it wasn't actually _him_ that was being shattered.

Crabbe and Goyle met him at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall, flanking him as per the seating arrangement they'd had since first year. Funny that these two buffoons were the only friends he still had, and not even because some unbreakable friendship bond existed between them, but because their fathers had ordered them to help him succeed. Still, he was somewhat grateful that he didn't have to look like a complete pariah. He didn't actually miss the others. Zabini, Parkinson, Nott. They could go to hell as far as he was concerned. They were ignorant and arrogant when it came to this war, and they didn't care that the stakes involved were unbearably high, so long as in the end, they turned out to be on the winning side. They didn't care that Draco's life danced on a knife's edge, along with the lives of his parents. One slip was all it might take. One slip was precisely what he could not afford. But he wasn't spending enough time in the Room to ensure that he ultimately succeeded, and he knew it. What he had found there three nights ago had set him back. It had distracted him.

_So why'd you do it, Draco? _He asked himself accusingly. He didn't have an answer.

Automatically his cold eyes found the Gryffindor table. She was there, sure enough. Long red hair, sleek and shining. Skin flawless apart from those awful Weasley freckles. Looking happy and carefree as she laughed with her friends. Draco blinked. Carefree?

He was instantly struck with a powerful confusion. How was it possible that this was the same creature he'd carried to his common room from the seventh-floor corridor only a couple of nights ago? Merlin, she was fucking laughing, as though she hadn't just had the shit beat out of her. As though it wasn't happening regularly. And he knew that it had to have been a regular thing – that kind of abuse didn't just happen spontaneously, he was well aware. There was always a build up, pushing the limits, seeing how far they could go. It occurred to him that maybe none of it had even happened. Maybe the stress and lack of sleep had finally caused him to snap, to go bloody barking mad and dream up some shite about finding a ravaged Gryffindor in the doorway of the Room of Requirement. Was there something psychological about dreaming up something like that?

But even as Draco's mind tried to formulate alternate theories, he knew that it was real. Though he had been dead exhausted and unsure of what he was doing or why he was doing it, he remembered everything about that night very clearly. The feather-light weight of her as he took her down the secret passageways to the dungeons, thinking only that he needed to get the dittany for her lip. The way she smelled like blood and sex mixed with jasmine. For the first time in months he was not dreading his next excursion to the Room or thinking of what might happen to him and his parents should he fail; all he could think as he watched Weasley interact normally with her friends was this: _How is she doing that_?

Draco had been staring for way too long, but he didn't realize it until it was already too late. Weasley turned her head, and just for a second, their eyes met across the Hall. He swallowed, suddenly feeling sick to his stomach. There it was.

She looked away very quickly, but not before he saw what a goddamn pretender she was.

Draco swept out of the Potions room as quickly as possible, before Snape could even form the words to tell him to stay back. He did not fear having points docked from Slytherin or being consigned to detention for deliberately ignoring a professor. Snape would do neither. Though he had refused to tell Snape anything about the exact parameters of his mission, the Potions master would not dare to interfere with the Dark Lord by causing Draco to waste time in useless punishments. He was just bitter, Draco thought. Bitter that _he_ hadn't been trusted enough to cause Dumbledore's downfall.

Mindless of the faces he passed, Draco angled his steps toward the library. The library was his best shot of actually getting work done, and his grades had taken such a dive in the past few weeks that he desperately needed to do well on his next assignments. He still had that elemental Transfiguration essay to do, reading and practice work for Charms, the exposition on the Draught of the Living Death in Potions... His footsteps slowed. The fog was beginning to pass across his mind again, eating at the corners of his vision like something infectious. On second thought, maybe the homework could wait a couple of hours. He pictured his bed, soft and warm and inviting. He hadn't slept much last night, or the night before that, or... well, not much at all this term, actually. He turned a corner and found himself right across from the Trophy Room. He'd already made it to the third floor? He didn't even remember going up the stairs. His breathing was shallow, so he paused to lean against the wall for a moment, digging his shoulder into the cold stone. Eyes clenched shut, he tried to orient himself, decide what he was actually doing. He was so tired...

Too tired to fight it when a hand gripped his arm and dragged him into a nearby room. He stumbled but managed to keep himself upright, wand instinctively drawn, eyes blinking rapidly to adjust to the sudden darkness.

"_Lumos_."

Light flooded the room, but not from Draco's wand, which he still held defensively before him. His mind managed to process that he was in the armor gallery. In his peripherals he could see dozens of suits of armor lining the walls like sentries, creaking gently of their own accord. One scratched its side with a screech of metal on metal. But that was not what he was focused on. He'd expected Snape. He'd expected that the Potions master had actually tried to corner him again to force information from him. But he wasn't looking into the black eyes and hooked nose of Severus Snape.

"Weasley," he said, but what he'd meant to sound scathing only came out sounding weary.

"Did you tell anyone?" Ginny Weasley asked, her brown eyes holding his threateningly.

What the hell was she talking about? Suddenly standing was too much for Draco. Ignoring the wand pointed at him, he slipped his own back inside his robes and sat down against the door.

"I don't have time for this," he muttered.

"I'm serious, Malfoy! I'll bloody hex you if you don't answer me."

"I'm sure you will." There was no condescension in his tone: he really believed that she would. But at that point, he couldn't have cared less. He almost welcomed it. She could hex him all the way into next term if she liked. At this point, he wasn't even sure he'd be _alive_ by next term. He watched as Weasley slowly lowered her wand arm. The light went out, thrusting them into pitch blackness.

Draco heard her step closer. He closed his eyes when he felt the tip of her wand press into his forehead. _Come on_, he thought. _Just two words. Make my day, Weasley_.

"I could cover you in boils," Weasley said. "Or bat bogeys. Or I could make you dance through the corridors naked in front of everybody."

"Mmhmm."

"You don't care?" The wand pressed even harder into his forehead.

"Do whatever the fuck you want, Weasley."

"Why don't you fight me?"

He said it before he could stop himself. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

Her hand struck his right cheek with surprising force. It actually hurt. He lifted a hand to his cheek, stunned. Before he could fully process that he'd just been slapped by a ninety pound Gryffindor girl, he heard the door open and slam shut again, and he was alone.


	2. Chapter II: Contradictions

**Author's Note: So first of all, I want to apologize to you all for the poor formatting on the last chapter. The uploading process made all my scene/point of view transitions really unclear... But hopefully, this chapter will be much better. Anyway, I'm really grateful for all the reviews I've already gotten. Keep 'em coming. :)**

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><p>"We're heading down to dinner, Gin. Are you coming?"<p>

Ginny flicked her eyes upward to meet Annie's questioning glance. "No," she replied with a smile. "I think I'll try and get some work done first. You lot can go on ahead."

Annie gave her a long look but left along with the other girls. She was grateful that her friend had let the matter of dinner drop. Lately she had taken to nagging Ginny about eating enough, which she found extremely frustrating. Pushing Annie out of her mind, Ginny leaned her head back against the plush red armchair and closed her eyes, just for a second, just to give them a break before she resumed reading. The heat from the fire warmed her face and made her feel drowsy; it loosened the iron grip she had placed on her thoughts, allowing them to wander, wander far away from the Charms book on her lap, far away from the common room...

_The heels of her hands were pressed against cold, slimy stone. She was shivering: from cold, from fear, from anticipation. It wasn't long now. It wasn't long until he would be here. She had been waiting for hours – where was he? Why wasn't he here? He had told her..._

_ And then the pale, handsome face was sliding into view out of the dim torchlight. Capped by dark, gently waved hair and inset with eyes like wells: dark and deep. They were eyes you could hurt yourself in. But only if you got too close; only if you fell. She looked up at him admiringly, but felt as though she'd been slapped when she saw that he wasn't smiling. Why wasn't he smiling? Wasn't he happy with her? Hadn't she done as he'd asked? Hadn't he been with her the whole time, inside her, helping her to paint those words on the wall? _

_ The blood rushed to her cheeks. "I did what you said," she said. "You told me to come here after, and I did. I did both things, then I came right away." She bumbled on and on._

_ "Ginevra." Tom's voice was soft like velvet, and she imagined there was warmth in it, even though the look in his eyes was dangerous. "My little Ginevra." He knelt before her. Ginny, eleven years old and small for her age, was paralyzed. Not by fear or by magic. By the weight of Tom above her, pressing against her, but before he could crush her, he evaporated into heavy smoke and vanished entirely. Tom was replaced by Harry, looking heroic with a sword and offering her a hand up. Before she could take it, Harry disappeared, too, and was replaced by a great snake preparing to strike. _

_ She turned her head to the side, not wanting to see when it sank its fangs into her. An inch away from her face was a pair of steel gray eyes. "You like it, don't you?" The voice asked. She screamed._

Ginny woke up with a start. The images were still fresh in her mind, fresh like paint, like walls painted red with blood. Her heart was pounding madly in her chest, which felt too constricted to contain it. She thought she might explode. Thoughtlessly she rose. Her Charms book slid off her lap and landed spine up on the carpet, like a tent. She left it there as she walked for the portrait hole, trying to keep her expression blank and her movements steady as several pairs of eyes followed her out. She wondered if she had _actually _screamed, if they had heard anything as she dreamed by the fireplace... But the eyes only appeared bored, not suspicious, so she didn't think so. She clambered out from behind the Fat Lady and began to walk.

She didn't know where she was going, but after an unknown amount of corridors and staircases that she passed by, she could no longer control the shaking. She braced herself against a wall only to sink down against it as her knees gave out. A gasping sob rose out of her chest, but she wasn't crying. Her eyes were dry. She was just startled, disturbed...

It had been a long time since Ginny had dreamed of Tom, and never so vividly, never to the point of nearly crying out like that. She berated herself viciously for letting her guard down. Even when she was only eleven, still a child, she had never once screamed when the nightmares struck. In fact, she had never spoken of the nightmares at all, to anyone, just as she had never told anyone how much she remembered of her first year at Hogwarts. Everyone had just assumed that she had been in a trance or something, and she had not bothered to correct them. It was easier that way than to let everyone – Harry, her parents, Dumbledore – see what she had really been. To see that she had wanted very much to please Tom, even as his requests had gotten blacker and blacker, because he was charming and reminded her of Harry, except that Harry didn't care about her or let her confide in him the way Tom did...

As Ginny's mind began to clear, she had to swallow down the disgust she felt for herself. Why was she letting all of this through? Why now, when she had been able to effectively keep it behind closed mental doors for so long? But she knew why. It was just a reminder that people always got what they deserved. People who want the wrong things for themselves always pay the price: just as she had nearly died at age eleven because she had both wanted and allowed Tom to control her. In many ways, she was still paying that price.

Slowly, her mind began to numb itself again to the effects of the dream. She felt much more composed now. She smoothed down her hair and stood, straightening her uniform as she did so. It was just in time, too, for she didn't hear the approaching footsteps until the figure had already turned the corner and walked up to her.

"Hi, Harry," Ginny said, surprised.

"Hey." Harry Potter watched her through his round-rimmed glasses. His face was familiar to her, and still as handsome as she had supposed when she was still to young to board the Hogwarts Express. She wasn't sure what she felt for him anymore. Before she could wonder what he was doing there, he had continued to speak: "I was just... er, I saw you in the common room. You jumped up and left pretty quickly. Is everything okay?"

The way he said it – as if he were performing his brotherly duty – made Ginny want to laugh in his face. Harry Potter, the Chosen One, destined to save the world, but not too high and mighty to look after little Ginny Weasley. _There's just one problem with that_, she thought, cocking her head at him. _You don't even see me. Not really._

"I'm perfectly fine, Harry." She flashed him a suggestive smile. "I just fancied a walk."

Harry grinned shyly, and Ginny knew that he had swallowed her lie as smooth as pumpkin juice. There was an awkward silence as he continued to look at her with a strange look on his face. She looked at him expectantly, since he looked like he was about to say something else. A few more uncomfortable moments passed before he did.

"Right." Harry straightened his glasses. "Right, well, I reckon I'll just head back to the commonroom, then, Hermione's looking over my Transfiguration essay..." He trailed off. "I'll see you later, Gin."

"Yeah, see you."

Harry looked back at her just before he turned the corner. "You're sure everything is alright?"

Ginny nodded. "Yeah. Everything is great."

Apparently satisfied, Harry left. This time, he did not turn back.

"You are such a fucking liar."

The voice made her jump. It was not Harry. Of course it wasn't Harry – he would never talk like that to her, or to anyone, for that matter. Ginny gritted her teeth and turned slowly.

"What do you want, Malfoy?" She glared at the taller boy's sharp features. In a way, it felt good to finally have someone she didn't have to smile at; the thought made her scowl even harder, as though her face were trying very hard to forget all the smiling she had forced it into lately.

"Tsk tsk, Weasley," said Malfoy in his infuriating drawl. "That's not very gracious of you."

"'Gracious'?" Ginny couldn't believe him. "Do you expect a thank you card or something? Because I'm sorry, but that's not happening. And what are you doing out here, anyway? Are you following me?"

Now it was Malfoy's turn to look disbelieving. "Excuse me? This coming from the one who stalked me, dragged me into a dark room, and proceeded to assault me? Hardly."

"You deserved to be assaulted," said Ginny scathingly.

"Yeah? Well, you don't."

Ginny's scowl fell promptly from her face, leaving her with only a comically confused expression. "What?"

"Get help, Weasley," said Malfoy slowly, as if explaining something very simple to someone very stupid. "You're messed up. I saw the way you lied to Potter just now. You're good at it, which is exactly why you need to stop before you end up at St. Mungo's, or dead." As he said all this, Malfoy had gotten very close to her, his footsteps accentuating his points. Ginny was staring directly at his chest; he was much taller than her. Suddenly, through her attempts to remain angry and defensive, she remembered how helpless she had felt when she awoke in his commonroom. How vulnerable and pathetic. Even now, being back in the context of Malfoy, she felt exposed.

She forced herself to look up into his gray eyes, encircled by deep shadows. He looked like shit, Ginny reflected. Everything about him looked haggard and weary. "Why do you care?" She hated that she was unable to keep her voice from trembling.

"I don't. But there is a war outside of these walls, Weasley. And maybe inside them, too, before long. You know that, right? Or are you too selfish to care that there are going to be enough casualties as it is?"

The scowl worked its way back onto Ginny's face. Malfoy didn't know what he was talking about, the pretentious git. Just because he'd happened to find her after... Ginny quickly pulled her mind back to Malfoy. The bastard. He didn't know _anything._

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><p>As Draco stood in front of the Weasley girl, watching the stubborness and denial pass across her face like an open book, he didn't think he'd ever been so pissed off in his life. Merlin, he knew that he was selfish, but this was ridiculous. Here someone was threatening her – had threatened her life – and she was refusing to find help even when it was offered. He thought of his own threats. The threats to his family. The unspoken, unspeakable thing that gnawed at his every waking hour like a beast. He hated Weasley. He hated her because she chose what was happening to her and because he himself would <em>kill <em>for a choice. Any choice but the only one left to him.

Maybe he'd been lying when he said she didn't deserve it. Draco was still fuming when he moved to walk past her, unable to stand her any longer, none-too-gently bumping her arm in the process. Something occurred to him, though, so he paused directly beside her; as if frozen, she had not moved.

"I won't talk to you again. Or help you."

"Good," said Weasley defiantly. "But if you tell anyone..."

"Save it, Weasley. You're not actually significant enough to be an interesting conversation point."

Draco walked away without looking back, glad to be leaving her behind. Whatever sliver of conscience had presented itself to make him tell her to try and find help was apparently satisfied and silent. He was still agitated about the encounter, however, by the time he reached the Room of Requirement. Her face flashed into his mind. She was a fool and he hated her. But that didn't explain why he still felt bad for her. Just like the furious scowl on Weasley's face, imprinted unwillingly into his mind, didn't explain why her brown eyes had been so...pleading. Pleading for someone to help her.

Draco found his way through the zigzagging pathway of the Room, past tottering, precarious piles of unclaimed rubbish, till finally he stood before the Vanishing Cabinet. _Help her_. That was a laugh. He couldn't even help himself.


	3. Chapter III: Mad Season

Draco glared at his empty desk and flicked his wand one more time. He was practically screaming the nonverbal spell in his head, but rather than conjure up the semi-major life form it was supposed to, his wand only spat out a few sparks and the potent smell of mildew.

"What seems to be the problem, Mister Malfoy?" asked McGonagall's severe voice. "You received full marks on this spell only last class period, did you not?"

Draco was well aware of that little tidbit of information. He had to resist the urge to scream in her face that _he didn't know _what the problem was, clearly, or he'd have conjured the damn cat already. But the truth was, he did know the problem. He was exhausted to the bone; so exhausted he felt the nausea swirling around in his stomach. He was beyond frustrated. And desperate. He couldn't focus – couldn't spare any of the little mental energy he still had on useless spells in useless classes. But he said none of that, because unlike Snape, McGonagall would not hesitate to give him detention.

"Yeah," he muttered. "I know the spell. I can get it."

"I'm sure you can. You will have the opportunity to make it up next class period."

Draco looked at her, uncomprehending.

McGonagall peered over the thin rims of her glasses. "You look ill, Mister Malfoy. I recommend that you go see Madam Pomfrey at once." The line of her mouth tightened. "Before you continue to make my classroom smell like something rotten." The older witch turned away from him and continued to walk among the desks.

Draco continued to stare for another few seconds. McGonagall was giving him permission to leave her class? She had never done that for anyone, as far as he knew, and certainly not a _Slytherin_.

"Still here, Malfoy?"

Draco shook himself out of his stupor and scooped up his things before McGonagall could change her mind. He murmured a quick thanks on his way past her, to which she responded with a severe look. Once in the corridor, he knew immediately that he was about to be sick. There was only one place where he was sure to have privacy, though, and that was two floors up. His stomach clenched threateningly. Sprinting despite the pain, he reached a tapestry that he knew concealed a passageway that would get him to the second floor much more quickly. Hopefully, it would be quick enough.

It was. Just barely. He muttered _"alohomora_" at the locked lavatory door labelled girls, and hoping that the locked door was enough to ensure that it was deserted, slammed through and vomited in the toilet of the first stall he reached without checking the rest. His stomach clenched and heaved painfully, but little actually came up, and nothing solid. His stomach was empty. He hadn't eaten since... well, since breakfast the day previous, if he remembered correctly. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and sat back, shaking. He had broken out in a light sweat and he felt feverish. He wanted to stand, to rinse out his mouth, but he felt too weak to move. The only thought that made it through his mind was that he was glad the lavatory was completely empty – even Myrtle must have been elsewhere in the castle, probably haunting the Prefect's bath.

Three more times he leaned over the toilet as his stomach expelled nothing but acids. The pain in his stomach was immense, and his head was now pounding fiercely. His mind slid in and out of a fevered haze, and he wondered dimly if McGonagall had been somewhat prophetic to send him out of class when she did.

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><p>Ginny could not stop herself from flinching when she felt the arm wrap around her waist. He was always doing that. <em>To be protective<em>, she told herself. _To claim what he thought belonged to him_, an inner voice countered. Ginny Weasley had her demons. But she didn't belong to them. And despite the impression she'd given Malfoy, she was very sick and tired of belonging to Adam Bartholomew.

She glared fiercely into his gorgeous features. "Get your hands off of me, Adam."

Adam raised his hands as if in surrender and took a step back. "Okay, kitten. Alright. What did I do now?"

Ginny gaped at him. "Friday night, you ass. Do you not remember _Friday night_?"

Adam looked at her blankly, his chestnut curls draped artfully across his forehead. Damn him for being so good looking. But what was he doing? What good was there in pretending it hadn't happened? Not that she remembered everything too clearly after his fist had come down against her temple.

"You left me there, Adam," she hissed. "You went too far and then you left me there."

Adam's face blanched. Merlin, he was good at this. And Malfoy had said she was good at lying.

"Oh God." He took another step back. "Ginny. I'm so sorry. I didn't know... I don't remember... I guess I remember asking you to meet me there. But I don't remember anything after that, I swear."

"How could you not remember?" Ginny's voice was very faint. She felt cold.

"I don't know... I guess I had a lot of firewhiskey. And a couple of pills that Cormac gave me, I didn't know what they were, but the last thing I remember after talking to you was waking up on the floor by my bed, in my dormitory."

What was he saying? His words fell over Ginny like ice cold water, draining her of energy. She wrapped her arms around herself. He really didn't remember? She had smelled the firewhiskey on his breath that night, had tasted it when his hot mouth had pressed onto hers, but she didn't really think... She didn't know what to think.

"Ginny..." She looked up at him. He was tall and extraordinarily well-built. Of course he was. He was a seventh year Gryffindor, popular in his year, known for being exceedingly charming. She remembered the butterflies that had been set loose in her stomach the first time he had talked to her at the end of fourth year, clearly flirting with her, clearly interested even though she was two years younger. She had seen herself as young and naive and broken. But when he looked at her, when he paid attention to her, she had felt strong and appealing, and never more so than the first time she realized the effect she had on him. When she realized just how badly he wanted to _be _with her, she had felt for the first time that she had _power _over someone. The power thrilled her, and she had used it to toy with him for weeks before he finally took it out of her hands. That was the first time that he'd gone too far – but she couldn't say that she hadn't had it coming to her. And he'd felt terrible – sobbing afterward as he healed her himself. No bruising, no scars.

"Ginny," he repeated, and reached for her hands. Limp, she allowed him to take them. "I'm so sorry. Whatever I did, I swear it wasn't me, and I swear it will never happen again." His emerald eyes looked innocent and pleading. "Please, Ginny, I know I've fucked up before. But I love you. You know that, right?"

"Yeah." Her voice sounded strangely disconnected to her own ears, as if she were listening to a recording of herself from a thousand miles away. "Yeah, I know."

The relief in Adam's voice was evident. "Then we're okay? Ginny?"

"I need some time to think, Adam."

His green eyes flashed dangerously, but only for an instant. Reluctantly, he nodded. "Okay, kitten. I'll owl you later." Ginny allowed him to kiss her cheek, but the contact of his soft lips only made her feel empty. She couldn't get away fast enough. She knew where she needed to go.


End file.
